Factory Reset

[Wally559903]

I bought my wife a new laptop and my grandson set it up. We have subsequently tried to log on but it doesn't recognise the password as remembered. It says to reset the p/w but you can't do that without logging in to the system. Probably the best solution is to do a factory reset and start again. How do you do that please?

[WAWood]

Wally559903

Hello;

Allow me to welcome you to the HP forums!

To factory reset your laptop, while it is booting, hold down the F11 key.

That will invoke the HP Recovery Manager, and using that, you can do a reset.

However, if you want to RETAIN what you have, there is another way -- to reset the password ...

Sorry, we're not allowed to tell you how to bypass the password ... but ... if you Google for Trinity Rescue Kit, you will be lead to a site where you can download an image file from which you can burn a CD. They might also have USB images -- don't know for sure.

If you get a lot of results, then go to the MajorGeeks site -- that is trustworthy.

Once you have this, you have a choice of media to create:
1) If you can boot from CD, download and install ImgBurn and use the Write Image to Disk option to create a bootable CD.
2) If you can boot from USB, download and install RUFUS and use the option to create a bootable USB stick from the ISO file.

Once you have made the boot media, boot your PC and use the option to BLANK the password.

After that, you should be able to login to the PC -- and then, set a new password.

Good Luck

[Wally559903]

I've tried the F11 solution but it just tahes you back to the start screen and when you press a key from there you're asked for the p/w again

[WAWood]

OK, then you need to reread my post and consider the second option -- using the utility to blank the password.

There is no other way around that.

[Wally559903 · Accepted solution]

Thanks for your advices on this.

Having spent several hours on this I have decided to return the laptop to the retailer for a refund. 

I fugured that if I have any further problems of this nature I don't want to spend hours to get it sorted. I can't see why it has to be so complicated

Thanks again